Hasta La Gadget!

Ross Rubin (@rossrubin) contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

Amazon’s Kindle DX includes a few tweaks such as automatically rotating the orientation of the screen when it is placed in landscape mode and adjustable page margins because… well, CEO Jeff Bezos seems to like the feature. Literally, though, the biggest change is the new 9.7-inch electronic ink screen, which displays two and a half times more content than the 6-inch screen on the Kindle 2 and Sony Reader. The expanded display allows more detailed graphics to be seen without zooming or panning, and is better suited to a wide range of source material including maps, technical diagrams, and sheet music. But textbooks and newspapers were singled out as two printed sources that are particularly significant for the forthcoming device.

These publications both benefit from the larger Kindle screen size, but each face different challenges in finding success on the Kindle DX. For newspapers, the Kindle DX cuts down on the costs of printing. Newspapers, though, are already struggling against competitors that did away with that expense years ago, including blogs that break stories and online entities such as Craigslist, eBay and Google that have siphoned away advertising revenue. Textbooks, on the other hand, have no major electronic competition, and print still retains advantages such as better readability and color. But digital textbooks must compete with used textbooks, a major market on college campuses, and likely will not be able to be resold if other digital content is a predecessor.

At the Kindle DX launch, representatives from The New York Times Company and Case Western Reserve University both characterized their involvement with the Kindle DX as a trial or experimentation. What’s behind the arm’s length embrace?

Continue reading Switched On: Big Kindle on Campus

Filed under: Handhelds

Switched On: Big Kindle on Campus originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 08 May 2009 17:12:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

Not every company producing smartphones cares much about other kinds of portable devices, but those that do can heed a lesson from Apple. By leveraging the popularity, platform, and distribution of the iPhone, Apple deftly created the market for iPod touch applications. One would now be hard-pressed to name another non-cellular handheld device that has access to as many modern applications as Apple’s flagship digital media player. Under some definitions, it has become the first mass-market Mobile Internet Device (or MID).

Targeting both phone and non-phone platforms has allowed Apple to greatly increase the installed base for iPhone applications. Last month, Apple announced that it had shipped 17 million iPhones, and 13 million iPod touches, increasing the base of devices for “iPhone” applications 76 percent.

Convergent devices like the iPhone and iPod touch are often looked at in terms of their potential to cannibalize a wide swath of other kinds of portable devices. These include the popular (digital cameras, portable navigation devices, handheld gaming platforms), the obscure (remote controls for presentation programs and the Sonos multi-room music system), and the humble (alarm clocks, calculators and pedometers).

Continue reading Switched On: Apps like to Movit, Movit

Filed under: Handhelds

Switched On: Apps like to Movit, Movit originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 23 Apr 2009 18:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

Barring any disruptive portfolio shifts prior to its introduction, the Palm Pre will complete a new competitive handset dynamic that began with the introduction of the iPhone. Each of the four major U.S. mobile operators will be emphasizing a capacitive touchscreen smartphone. Curiously, none come from any of the top five global phone manufacturers. And even more curiously, each will be powered by a different operating system as the Pre at Sprint jockeys with the iPhone at AT&T, the BlackBerry Storm at Verizon Wireless, and the T-Mobile G1.

These signature handsets go beyond exclusives or even strong identification with the service provider. They bear the burden of attracting consumers looking for the coolest phone experience or at least minimizing the impact of the other signature handsets. In return, carriers lavish marketing dollars on them. Their role exemplifies a transformation of the market from the days when the RAZR was every carrier’s “it” phone and operators competed on their particular shade of pink .

The carriers’ selection of their signature handsets must be disappointing to Microsoft, which cannot claim a Windows Mobile device among them. Indeed, the single mobile operator Microsoft highlighted at Mobile World Congress as being an exceptional partner was France’s Orange. It’s not as if an operating system must be exclusive to the device as there are other BlackBerrys out there (although, as Verizon Wireless tirelessly notes, the Storm is the first touchscreen BlackBerry). And it is only an accident in time that has made the G1 the exclusive Android handset. It certainly isn’t about application support as incredibly all of the current signature handsets will have debuted without extensive third-party programs available.

Regardless, though, and despite efforts by HTC, Sony Ericsson and Samsung to skin Windows Mobile as well as Microsoft’s own improvements in Windows Mobile 6.1, there is a perceived cachet to these four signature phones that the best Windows Mobile devices are not yet delivering.

Continue reading Switched On: The “phonetastic four” versus Windows Mobile

Filed under: Cellphones

Switched On: The “phonetastic four” versus Windows Mobile originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Feb 2009 16:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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After years of providing the devices on which we spoke, Verizon is finally providing the Hub. The Verizon Hub is not the first VoIP product to use that moniker — with pay upfront for lifetime long distance startup Ooma having used the “hub” name for its primary home phone adapter — but the telco’s take on the screenphone represents a turning point in the evolution of consumer telecommunications.

For much of its existence, the cell phone had long played second-fiddle to the home phone as the wireless wonders implied expensive plans and inferior voice quality. Increasingly, though, consumers are finding connections to data services as critical as voice connections, and despite attempts that have ranged from the Cidco iPhone (yes, there was one years before iPhones by Cisco and Apple) and more recently the RSS-savvy GE InfoLink (now abandoned by Thomson’s exit from the cordless handset business), the home phone has begun to lag far behind its portable cousin as an Internet resource.

Enter our nation’s two largest telecom providers. Triple-play aspirant Verizon Wireless has joined rival AT&T in offering a touch-screen, Internet-savvy home phone system heavy on information delivery and communications functionality while working with up to four DECT expansion handsets. Unlike the questionably named Samsung HomeManager offered by AT&T, the screen on the Verizon Hub cannot be carried conveniently about the house like a tablet display. The Verizon Hub also uses IP for its voice and data communications whereas HomeManager uses broadband for data and a traditional circuit-switched connection for voice calls. Why would Verizon blithely bypass its own copper?

Continue reading Switched On: Verizon Hub is a handset homecoming

Filed under: Displays, Misc. Gadgets, Wireless

Switched On: Verizon Hub is a handset homecoming originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 Feb 2009 17:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

In 2008, a year in which some of the most-used American political buzzwords were “change” and “maverick”, many technology companies bucked conventional wisdom. With rising penetration across a broad range of mainstream consumer technology categories, it has become more difficult than ever to compete in the device space if you’re not bringing something different to the party.

The year did not start out auspiciously for those going against the grain, as CES 2008 brought news of Warner Brothers’ decision to exclusively support Blu-ray as opposed to underdog HD DVD. The move set off a swift collapse of the HD-DVD partnership and Toshiba officially threw in the towel a few months later.

Meanwhile, in San Francisco, Steve Jobs used part of what is slated to go down as his final Macworld Expo keynote to announce something that wasn’t very surprising — shifting the focus of Apple TV from a PC-centric content shifter to a broadband video store. But two open-source efforts have stepped in to shake up the home video space – Boxee, which can run on Apple TV hardware, and NeurosLink, the open-source hardware developer’s foray into a set-top box optimized for streaming video from the Internet. Neuros currently has a list of bounties posted, offering dollars for developers who can bridge gaps in its software’s functionality.

Continue reading Switched On: When hardware startups zagged

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets

Switched On: When hardware startups zagged originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 29 Dec 2008 19:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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